


The Dilemma of Violet and Delilah of Violence

by MetellaStella



Category: The Incredibles (2004)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Past, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-17
Updated: 2018-06-17
Packaged: 2019-05-24 16:28:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14958099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MetellaStella/pseuds/MetellaStella
Summary: Violet was hiding something.He was sure of it.





	The Dilemma of Violet and Delilah of Violence

Bob, after his short stint at solo parenting, 17 hour recovery nap, and a couple of months after the signing incident had picked up a few things along the way. He was observing his kids’ day to day emotions a lot more closely than he ever had. Both of them had reacted well to his and Helen’s being picked up for hero duty by the FBI. They weren’t aware of the wrangling over budgets and fears that using taxpayers to support supers would set off another backlash. 

Despite the number of times Violet had objected to him and Helen keeping secrets from them, she and Dash were still just kids. They didn’t need to burden themselves with complications like these just yet, in his opinion. And Violet still did want some normalcy. He understood that, and he implemented ways to give her as much of it as possible. So, he had picked up on Violet’s moods when she could tell they weren’t being completely transparent. They were logged in his mind. But there was something else going on, more recently. Inbetween days where he and Helen were tight lipped, out of nowhere she would still sulk. Sometimes she would snap, snatch something away from Dash, or start an argument about nothing. He asked her about how she was doing, about school, about Tony, and her positive answers seemed to check out. He had even sat down to talk with the boy one day just to make sure.

  
Then he started second-guessing himself. Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it wasn’t ‘nothing’, but just some other teenage slump. He took Helen aside one day. “Have you noticed Violet has been acting more like . . . well, like she did before our little island adventure?”

  
She raised her eyebrow. “Bob, this is a big adjustment for the kids. Just because it’s a positive one doesn’t mean it can’t be disorienting.” She had a bit of a condescending tone.

  
“But Dash is smoothing out a lot,” he pointed out, “he’s even getting into watching Jack-Jack because it’s not, as he says ‘boring.’”

  
“Don’t compare our children to each other,” Helen sniffed. “They’re very different.”

  
“I _know_ OK?” he said, annoyance bubbling up, “It’s just. Something is off, Helen. Call it a gut feeling.”

  
Her eyes sparkled mischievously. “Oh, is my _big strong_ hero developing _womanly intuition_ after a mere taste of what it’s like to take care of three growing children?”

  
“Helen, be serious!” he said angrily. Really he meant _take him seriously_ , because lately she didn’t seem to be doing that often.

  
“I _am_ being serious. You’re the one overreacting. I can’t believe I’m the one having to say this . . . but you’re worrying over nothing. Usually that’s my job.” She had grown a bit more contemplative. “I know Jack-Jack has you on edge. You didn’t have to deal with Dash when he was running up walls or Violet when she was making pots and pans invisible and leaving them around the house to trip on. Oh, I could go on about their shenanigans. Their powers atrophy as they age. It’ll happen with Jack-Jack too, don’t worry.”

  
“Why didn’t you . . . “ he pressed his lips together. “Why did you never tell me more about that stage more?”

  
“You had to worry about concealing your own powers and things at work,” she said softer, “I didn’t want to add to that stress.”

  
He heaved a sigh and brushed her cheek. “You’re amazing, you know that?”

  
“I could stand to hear it more,” she quipped.

“I’ll make a note.” He kissed her softly, momentarily forgetting why he had brought her there in the first place.

* * *

 

But, like a rude awakening, the very next day Violet was at it again and he kicked himself for not pressing the point. Helen was away at a meeting, but he had had enough of this. He was torn between desire to wait for her in order to put up a united front, and impatience to get this dealt with. Then again, what if she just brushed him off again? That tore it. Impatience won out.

  
“Come here, young lady.” He shooed her up the stairs and into his room. Going into her room would give her the home field advantage, and he didn’t feel like playing by her rules or on her turf right at the moment.

  
“Violet, I know there is something wrong. _Please_ tell me what it is.”

For a moment absolutely cold fury washed over him from her stare.

  
“Do you _want_ a secret identity? I know your mother and I are public figures now, but you are old enough to go to a boarding school. You can have a shot at privacy, if you want it. At least for these few years.”

  
Despite all the sincerity he could muster, it did not put one chink in her armor.

  
“Violet, why won’t you talk to me? It isn’t because we don’t tell you things . . . you get over that faster than whatever this is. I need to know.”

  
Her expression didn’t change.

  
“Okay then. Just tell me . . . that it isn’t anything that might put the family in danger? Right?”

  
Her aggravated sigh and eyeroll were almost reassuring.

  
“Fine, you can go.”

Perhaps he’d simply have to take another stab at convincing his wife this was important.

  
She stopped in the doorway.

  
She angled her head halfway towards him. Then, turning back again, she went invisible.

 

Oh man, was she so upset as to lose control over that?

  
He settled on the bed and then threw himself back to stare at the ceiling. It seemed every time their family was growing back together, some wrench came into the works. The TV was on loud downstairs, drowning out her padding to her room and shutting the door. At least she didn’t slam it.

  
“Dad.” -he leapt off the bed in surprise- “VIOLET, just because I’m super doesn’t mean you can’t give me a heart attack!” he clutched at his chest.

“Sorry,” she whispered, very close, clothes looking disembodied.

  
“I thought you’d left.”

  
“Yeah, I gathered that,” her sarcasm sounded a little . . . choked?

“Oh sweetheart,” he said much softer when he realized she was crying.

  
“Tough old dad’s getting a little jumpy?” she said, voice watery and thin despite the teasing. “You’ve faced much worse things.” The second sentence actually held some admiration, he thought. Briefly he thought of the days she would sit in his knee and drink in stories of his adventures. 

  
“I’m still capable of being startled, same as anyone else,” he said a little stiffly. “And when someone says something _right next to your ear_ when you thought you were _alone_ . . . “

  
“. . . sorry,” she said again. She sniffed, and he pictured her wiping a hand across her nose and eyes. It was somehow that much more heartbreaking not to be able to _see_ his daughter’s pain.

  
“What _is_ it, honey?”

As if a switch had been flipped, her voice went steely. “In school, we’ve been learning about organs that atrophy with age. The thymus that builds T-cells. The pineal gland that regulates sleep. It reminded me of Jack-Jack. Something else reminded me of this family. _We learned Punnett squares.”_

_  
_ He was glad at least not to be caught in that glare. He waited for her to go on, but then realized that was all she was going to say.

Was there some significance he was missing? It seemed so.

  
As the silence grew longer, it became more and more apparent that he wasn’t getting something she thought was obvious.

  
As if to confirm it, she prompted, “Anything to say about that?”

  
“Uh? I haven’t been following your homework as closely as Dash’s” he said quickly, “And I’m sorry I haven’t, is that what you need? Some help?”

  
She made an enraged sound that only a teenager could, full of disgust and contempt. “Oh my god, dad, are you playing stupid, because that is- just- SO-” apparently she could not think of anything adequate, because she left the sentence dangling there. Her sweater threw down its arms, and he could guess that her hands were tightly balled at the end of the sleeves.

He knitted his brow. “I’m not. Really I’m not.”

  
Her sweater crossed its arms, and he could almost feel himself being cross-examined. Feel the empty space above the sweater neck testing his sincerity.

  
“So. You don’t know that black mice can be crossed to get blonde mice . . . but about only one fourth of them will have that trait. And that you _can’t cross blonde mice to get black mice._ ”

As if to emphasize her point, her black hair came back, but oddly, her face did not.

  
Panic started creeping up his throat. Oh. Oh. OH. **OH.**

“Redheds are even more recessive than blonde. All this time, you and mom have lied to me. I’m _not your child_ , and though I think that it’s admirable that you’ve taken me on, that you started dating her anyway or- or- _forgave_ her or _whatever_ happened-”

“Violet,” he said sternly. “Your mother did _not_ cheat on me. Believe that. I’m sorry. I am. I think we need to wait until she gets home to have the rest of this conversation.”

* * *

 

Helen, predictably, was _not_ pleased to be faced with her daughter’s questioning. But Bob could tell she was trying to contain herself, and doing a fairly good job.

  
“Violet . . . you know your dad and I moved around a lot. We didn’t have a lot of time to put down roots, gain a lot of friends. We were hair-trigger, and it made us feel more comfortable, plus it was just necessary sometimes. So no one questioned when we brought a baby daughter into a new house together . . . after all, they hadn’t known me for the last 9 months, so they had no reference to know that I hadn’t been pregnant.”

  
She paused, letting that sink in, face drawn up in sympathy.

  
“Wait, so-” Violet’s words stumbled on faintly, “I’m . . . I’m not even _your_ daughter?” Her invisibility flickered on and off wildly. “I-I didn’t even consider- I mean I at _least_ thought-”

  
Bob put a hand on her shoulder to steady her.

She crumpled into his arms and the teen had lost all pretense of outrage. She simply sobbed. Unseeable water soaked through his shirt, and briefly the threads even reacted, spider webs of them disappearing and reappearing in ripples.

  
Helen came forward as if to do the same, to embrace her, but her eyes were haunted and she faltered. “I . . . I’m so sorry. I didn’t think . . . I didn’t think . . . “

  
“Yeah you DIDN’T-” instantly back on the attack again, Violent pried herself away from Bob’s hug. “You DIDN’T think about whether I WANTED to know the truth, and Mom OH MY GOD how many other people know this _one simple biological fact_ that both of you IDIOTS overlooked, and think things about **_you_**??? Maybe my difficulty having friends was due to their parents talking about you or steering them away??? And if they weren’t, how am I going to live this down at school? Why couldn’t you have just raised me knowing? Would it have been that horrible?”

  
Bob and Helen looked at each other, at a loss for words.

  
“Do you even . . .” she swallowed. “Do you even know who my parents are? I have super powers . . .  did a villain kill them?”

  
“It’s . . . complicated.” Helen said quietly. “Our wedding was a very small and close knit affair. We knew two sisters, both from a non-powered family home. A very broken one at that. Violet . . . listen . . . at first we didn’t want to have any children. To bring kids into this world who would have to grow up having to deal with the ban, it seemed wrong. But you. You were so wonderful that you changed our minds.”

  
Violet’s breath caught.

  
“Never doubt that you’re every bit as precious to us as flesh and blood,” she went on warmly. “Possibly . . . in that way . . . even more so. There’s such a big age gap between you and Dash because initially our resolve was holding out . . . but you were a responsible little girl, even if it caused you to be withdrawn. You didn’t worry us nearly as much as the boys have. And I expect you’ll use that knowledge judiciously, and not wield it against your brothers,” she childed gently.

  
She looked to Bob. He cleared his throat. “These sisters at our wedding . . . they had had a bad falling out years prior. We had tried to mend the bond between them, because each of them was very important to the super community . . . though, in almost opposite ways. The younger one, _with_ powers, dabbled in villainry . . .  some saw her as a Robin Hood type, others informed us that was just a front to cover up her own selfishness. It was hard to get the full story. But, she forcibly found out our identities and told them to her older sister. Fortunately, her sister already knew us. She had had the good sense not to reveal us to her. In her rage at being one-upped, or at least that was the way she saw it- she almost miscarried a child she was pregnant with, and suffered brain damage from a stroke. The younger one was named Delilah. The older one, Edna.”

“I’m . . . Edna’s _niece??_ ” Violet gasped, mouth hanging slightly open. “And all this time, I’ve . . . barely even gotten to _interact with her!_ ” Her anger was quickly being redirected, but Bob attempted to ground her again, putting a hand on her hair, so like Edna’s straight and shiny shafts. She said sharply, “I should’ve seen it sooner . . . even our noses look similar, not straight and pointy like all of _yours._ ” The alienating word left her lips, and both adults winced.   
  
Bob soothed, “Listen, Vi, this is a very painful and very wrenching part of  Edna’s past. You know she is a very insular and independent person regardless. Perhaps even you share some of her insularity.”

  
Helen said, “However. She did not ask us to do this. I don’t think she wouldn’t have dared.”

  
“Too proud,” Bob summed up succinctly, and Helen shot him a look.

  
“She might’ve arranged for you to be taken care of. But her sister told her doctors she wanted _us_ if she died, despite having considered us enemies some of the time. Edna claimed that taking care of you would be like taking care of a stranger’s child, and I want to take her at her word, but personally I think she didn’t feel as if she could grieve her sister properly if she was taking care of a child. Added resentment was possible.”

  
“Her work was crucial, too,” Bob explained. “At that time she was not charging many supers for their suits.”

  
“That’s no excuse!” Violet cried, “Turning your back on your family-”

  
“Now listen,” Bob growled, “I don’t think you realize that your mother and I would probably not be alive right now if it weren’t for Edna’s dedication. Plenty of supers who were doing off the cuff vigilante work didn’t know about her, and were burning through regular old clothes.”

  
“So they . . .” the immature part of the teen poked through in a half-giggle, “were out nude?”

  
“It’s not funny,” Bob said gravely. “If you’re singed and slashed and worried about being exposed, your head is not 100% in the fight. And some that were unlucky enough to get killed were charged with public indecency _after_ the fact, unfair though it was. That was not a major component of the rising tide against supers, but it wasn’t insignificant either. It’s not talked about a lot nowadays, but that’s primarily because Edna’s continued pioneering has made it an obsolete issue.”

Violet took a several seconds to process all of that.

“Listen, honey,” Helen said, “I know Edna is a bit full of herself, but there’s a lot more she could hold over the heads of heroes if she really wanted to. She doesn’t take credit nearly enough, by some measures. She has other flaws, yes. If you really want to dredge all of this up on her, we’ll stand behind you. But I really think it’s best if you got to know her first without charging in with a bunch of interrogation. She’s taken a keen interest in Jack-Jack, and I don’t see any reason why we can’t leverage that as an excuse to get you to spend more time with her, too. She’s hard to read. She might be uncomfortable around you. She might not. But . . . just be sensitive, all right?”  
  
Violet nodded, and both of her parents hugged her.


End file.
